Unleash the Blogs, II

Susan GerhardApril 30, 2006

Is it possible that Big Tilda in the real is bigger than Lucy Gray’s larger-than-life projections of her onto City Hall? It appeared so Saturday evening at the Kabuki, as she delivered a potent State of the Cinema address in steep high heels. “The Evening Class’s” Michael Guillen quotes Swinton on her mentor, Derek Jarman, shortly after the event closed: “He taught us all to be lawless or encouraged us all to believe in our own lawlessness, which I can’t recommend more highly.” But just in case anyone left the address feeling smug with their newfound pearls of wisdom from Swinton, Guillen also features Jean-Claude Carriere quoting Luis Bunuel: “We always have to follow people who are looking for truth and run away from people who have found it.”

It was week two of the San Francisco International Film Festival, and the citizen press corps was out in full force looking for truth… or something like it. Min Jung Kimcomments on “You are my Sunshine:” “A lovely and sweet Korean flick HIV romcom between a cowfarmer and a coffee bar prostitute. Um. Yeah. I know it sounds weird but it’s not the strangest film I’ve seen today….” Wendy, from SFist, once spent “several very fun, yet dark weeks in Hamburg, Germany,” and added a few more hours to the tally with German film “Seeds of Doubt.” HellonFriscoBay finds both “Factotum’s” Matt Dillon and SKYY Prize contender “News From Afar” worthy of serious gazing — and still finds time to cover films all over San Francisco, from “Sisters in Law” at the Balboa to “The Fallen Idol” at the Lumiere. Bayflickschecks in on “Who Killed the Electric Car? and the silents at the Castro. The Eddie Underground finds something to trip on in “Site Specific: Las Vegas 05,” in the Circles of Confusion program: “The magic here was the way in which focus and depth of field were manipulated thereby creating a world where everything seemed like it was in miniature. I was expecting a plastic Godzilla to sloppily bounce it at any moment. Very cool stuff.”

God spoke, or Al Franken did, to Jory Des Jardins. Kevin Smokler offers up a little South African music, as well as short takes on “American Blackout” and “Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela.” Cirne’s Enric captured video from the light-and-music “Scribble Scrapple IC You” performance and features a Steve Rhodes interview with Adrian Belic. Spideysenses briefly stops in on the Paris of “The Perfect Couple.” Tiger Beat checks in on Big Tilda, on her last night at City Hall, and — in discussing Alan Berliner’s “Wide Awake” — he confesses to having a condition that I can only imagine most bloggers share: Insomnia.

Awful reality interrupted the film festival on Friday in the form of a heartbreaking car crash and its fiery aftermath; a few hours later, the Castro screening of Harry Smith’s “Heaven and Earth Magic” with live score by Deerhoof — as reported by both Angry Pirate and Mollygolightly — was not cancelled, but the theater was filled with an acrid smell and very eery feeling. Our sympathies go out to the victim’s family and friends.